Job description:
Rain Garden/Residential Native Landscape Designer
Full-time employment including overtime.
* flexible schedule, sometimes working 12 hour days and/or weekends in the high season and light work in the winter. Work from home possibly 1 – 2 days per week.
15.00 – 18.00 per hour + mileage reimbursements, phone reimbursements
No benefits included; you will be insured and eligible for workers compensation, and receive overtime if you work more than 40 hours in a week, we have ½ hour paid lunch for a six hour work day minimum.
You would be making an impact on the stormwater challenges facing the District of Columbia, planting native plants, encouraging pollinators, learning about our environment and helping clean up the Chesapeake Bay and local watersheds. You would also serve as steward to those clients unfamiliar with the benefits of rain gardens and bayscapes, and helping to expand the company and provide jobs for friends and co-workers. You would be working with a Chesapeake Bay Landscape Professional, and a certified installer of Interlocking Concrete Pavement (permeable pavers).
Bona Terra is a small family run urban landscape design, maintenance, and installation business that specializes in artistic installations, bay-friendly rain gardens, conservation planting, and careful maintenance. We prioritize organic, sustainable practices and protecting the local watershed. We are a creative group of artists, musicians, and writers, so anyone with an artistic or creative background will be given special consideration.
We contract with The Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay and the District Department of Energy and Environment (DOEE) to install Rain Gardens and Bayscapes under the Riversmart Homes Program. These stormwater projects are designed and installed according to the DOEE requirements on residential properties that qualify for grants and rebate programs.
You will be communicating with the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay and the DOEE on a regular basis to request client names, submit photographs, talk about projects, and finish invoicing etc. Your job will be to process client names and information, schedule and attend meetings with 5 – 7 homeowners on average per week for one-hour sessions each, take ‘before’ photographs and measurements, draw up designs and make plant lists for rain gardens or bayscapes and submit them to homeowners and the Alliance for approval. You will be responsible for communicating scheduling issues and shifts with clients and communicating client preferences and issues with the Riversmart Installations Manager; and, ultimately, submitting invoices and ‘after’ photographs once projects are complete.
You will be responsible for providing work for two crews of two people each, 4 – 5 days a week, for 10 months, with a light schedule in the winter. The crews will be managed in the field by the Riversmart Installations Manager, who will also be your partner on scheduling, buying, and supplies. You must be available for emergencies by phone or email any day that your crew is in the field.
We use Mac computers, Quickbooks, Excel, Word, Gmail, Google Drive & Calendar, Photoshop, Dropbox for most of our work. We are open to considering other programs. Most designs are currently done on paper and scanned. You will be issued a work laptop and expected to care for it, maintain updates, etc.
Applicants will be evaluated based on qualifications, and the person with the most qualifications will be offered the job.
Ideally you will have:
A clean driving record and experience driving for five years or more, having your own vehicle or bicycle is a plus but not required.
A smart phone with sufficient data plan, so that you can use it for navigation, taking before and after photos, and checking email regularly when at meetings or in the field.
You will need to:
Track and maintain files and paperwork.
Track and be responsible for personal hours, mileage etc.
Measure a site, create a scale drawing, cross-section drawing and design.
Be able to calculate stormwater run-off and capacity, or learn easily to calculate stormwater run-off and capacity by using formulas.
Be able to identify soil types and accurately assess amendments.
Have a working assessment of water run-off and predictability.
Be able to perform a perc test, or talk a client through the process of performing one.
Know and use scientific plant names and understand rules for binomial nomenclature.
Be familiar with native plants and be interested in learning and memorizing the scientific names of plants, growing conditions, maintenance, division, re-seeding and common name of all the native plants on Bona Terra’s native plant list.
Be able to park legally and in challenging circumstances for example parallel parking on busy streets and in tight alleyways
Be able to handle additional residential design and work, with the help of the installation foreman and upper management.
Know how to install and maintain rain gardens and bayscapes, including downspout hook up, spillway, measuring berms, soil amendments, etc.
Must be able to present and maintain a professional appearance and communicate with clients, and vendors in a courteous, clear and timely manner.
We are a small tight-knit company and we work from a home office, you must be comfortable with a casual office environment, including a dog and two cats.
Please send your resume to bonaterradc@gmail.com
